A version of this originally appeared on the supernatural blog, The Mystery of the Haunted Vampire as Haunted Treehouse.
At the suggestion of someone in the comments, this was going to be my return to writing Got a happy story? but the digital camera got sand in it at the beach.
OK, it’s not really haunted. It’s not exactly in a tree either. (Or a house for that matter.)
But the girls love it. I built it for them one weekend this summer from mostly scrap lumber. They dubbed it Fantastic Treehouse and put a sign on top with the name.
It has a trapdoor to the second level. I built the lower level at a low height for the toddler girl. She spends all of her time on the top floor.
Too small to see, but just above the stairs is a sign in crayon “No Boys allowed.”
The green thing in the bottom right corner is their turtle sandbox. In front of it is the counter where they sold so many “sand” cones to each other I need to buy more sand.
They spend a lot of time in it creating their own worlds. One hour it’s a superhero hideaway where they discuss their superhero powers and secret identities. (They seem to spend a lot more time discussing their superpowers than in fighting supervillains.) The next hour it’s a pirate ship (except they’re armed with Star Wars light sabers.) Other times its a castle.
But it’s a place they call their own to build their own happy stories.
And that’s my happy story tonight. Your happy story can be about anything you want it to be.
I’m thinking of bringing back Carnacki’s Chiller Theater for here.
Good to be seeing more of you lately; welcome back. It would be a delight to have either Happy Stories and/or Chiller Theater as often as you feel like it.
Don’t have anything in particular in the way of happy stories, but I’m about to go out to dinner with my wife & teenage son (which is happy, but short on plot, although all three of us are characters!). Maybe one will develop before the evening is over. 🙂
And just in time for Halloween too — the favorite and most thoroughly celebrated holiday (even though it isn’t one) in this household!!
For the return of CCT here!
That’s the number to call if you’re a Chicagoan, or know someone who is, who needs eye surgery and can’t afford it.
And there is more good news for the Windy City in the pipeline 😉
It’s just a baby step, but it is a start, and it is a baby step that for Chicago folks who would like to see more of their world, will be a giant leap!
That is a happy story!
Hopefully W will have the sense to see the chance for “detente” when it hits him in the face, although I’m not holding my breath…
Now, see. Ducttape? Who says you’re doom and gloom all the time?
😉
Thanks for posting the treehouse picture! When we were kids, we had a huge barn to play in…we would climb up on the top of the stalls with the rope and swing out over the hay, kick off the barn wall, and leap back onto the top of the stalls for the next person’s turn. On rainy days, we would play hide and seek, sometimes hiding just by climbing up the rafters to to the top of the barn. (about 3 stories up; to this day, I wonder why our parents never realized what crazy things we were up to!) We had forts set up all through the barn, and we’d chase each other, jumping through trapdoors and climbing out windows and down trees. In the winter, the pond would freeze, and we’d skate for hours, sometimes playing hockey, sometimes just imitating Dorothy Hamill (yeah, I know…).
And that’s my happy memory for tonight.
Does it count that in two minutes I’m leavin’ work and then it’s HAPPY HOUR?!?
No? Okay, well then here’s my real contribution to a great blogging tradition that I hope continues 😉
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I live roughly 100 miles away from my hometown as well as the vast majority of my friends who have colonized the Phoenix metro area. Last weekend, for the first time in several years, my two best friends came down to visit for the entire weekend. We’ve known each other since diapers yet have grown apart over the years as happens when someone relocates.
Anywho, we had an amazing time together from their arrival Friday evening to their departure late Sunday night. We went to the casino, I hit a jackpot on a random nickel slot machine that I was passing ($500!!!), then we went out in downtown Tucson for Fall Crawl, which is a bi-annual local/live music festival.
All in all, it was great to reconnect, enjoy one anothers friendship like the old days, and hear some awesome tunes. We also totally destroy ourselves with liquor so I’m sure that is helpful to my positive recollection 😉
Lesseee….
Not so much stories (at least not yet) but plenty of happy!
😉
The bankruptcy finally got filed today, that’s pretty happy!
Kiddo the elder got student of the month regocnition for Compassion, way cool and makes me feel not so paraniod about my abilities as a parent.
I have a package on its way from kansas which I must give her a shout-out for sending!!
Hub has taken next Tuesday off, plans for the day include a post-bankruptcy budget summit and our long neglected date to watch Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and get goofy with one another.
Halloween is coming — our major family holiday!!
I am not at all surprised that, of all the things to be recognised for, Kiddo the Elder is known for his compassion…that apple didn’t fall far from his tree, did he? 🙂
Glad things are going better!
Thanks, CG, gotta learn to point a bit of that fierce compassion toward myself sometimes though….
Thank you for your support these past coupla weeks!!
I had my first telephone conversation with my grandson who is 14 months old- last night! He actually responded with a yup to everything I said and then he did his little baby lion growl-which is our “code”. It made my day and I am still chuckling.
My daughter said he was smiling and very concentrated on our conversation.